PRAISE FOR THE BANG-BANG CLUB
“The Bang-Bang Club is refreshing in its
political and emotional forthrightness. At the end, the
authors—wounded, hardened, defeated, victorious, chastened,
sustained—reject both grandiosity and guilt, arriving instead at a
hard-earned but sensible conclusion: ‘We had not personally
suffered like some of the people we photographed, but neither were
we responsible for their suffering—we had just witnessed
it.’”
—Los Angeles Times
“They have written a compelling account of what
it is like to be a war correspondent in one’s own country, regarded
as traitors by the establishment (whose role in the violence they
attempted to expose). They do not see themselves as heroes, their
creed being to shoot pictures first and aid victims later. They
suffer from the survivor’s guilt that dogs war correspondents, but
with the number of villains in their story it is a wonder that they
found the time to criticise themselves.”
—The Independent
“What this book does is highlight the extreme
pressures and stress that those who make a career out of conflict
photography must expect to endure.”—African Business
“This book is one that any student of Africa and
especially South Africa, journalism, and photography will want to
read.”
—African Studies Quarterly
“Here is a fascinating look at how
photo-journalism is done and the heavy toll it took on four young
men covering South Africa’s bloody struggle for freedom. To read
this book is to feel the early morning wake-up calls, the menace of
a crowd getting ready to kill, the shame that can go with taking a
prize-wining photograph of human misery. Parts of it will haunt
you.”
—SUZANNE DALEY, former Johannesburg
Bureau Chief for the New York Times
Bureau Chief for the New York Times
“This powerful account intertwines the personal
and professional lives of four journalists, known as the Bang-Bang
Club, who helped bring the struggle for the end of apartheid in
South Africa and other conflicts into the worldview. ... In this
highly readable account, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Marinovich, who
narrates the stories, and Silva, whose voice is represented in the
third person, openly discuss this and other topics concerning the
morality of journalism. . . . Libraries with collections on
journalism or South Africa should seriously consider purchasing
this engaging work, which raises many important questions.”
—Library Journal
“This is a gripping account of the bloody
action. Just as dramatic is the bitter inner conflict of those who
risk their lives to bring us the news, their courage and commitment
as well as their self-doubt.”—Booklist
“Balancing adventure-seeking bravado,
professional competition, genuine friendship, and the stark fear of
war coverage, the authors vividly describe a bloody revolution
against white rule and how each came to terms with his own
less-than-passive role in the violence.”
—Memphis Flyer
“If you have every wondered why some men need to
live on the edge, this grippingly candid trip into the ‘dead zones’
of war journalism will thrill, shock and finally move you.”
—JOHANNA MCGEARY, chief foreign correspondent
for TIME
“I have met Greg and João in ‘nasty places’ in
both Africa and the Balkans, good men to be on a shitty road with.
And suddenly, a great book reveals to me what they have gone
through collectively and individually, in the midst of South
Africa’s tragic history. At once, through their unique voice, I
feel I’m in the car with them turning a corner onto a road that
maybe we should not venture, that of history in the making: real,
nasty, unavoidable and all too human.”
—GILLES PERESS
“The Bang-Bang Club succeeds where other,
more self-important histories of the conflict in South Africa have
failed.”
—Philadelphia City Paper